


Hey Little Sister, Who's The One You Want?

by bluesquints



Category: Iron Fist (TV), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Abortion, Brother-Sister Relationships, Coming of Age, Consensual Sex, F/M, Family Angst, POV Third Person, Pre-Series, Romance, Sibling Incest, Ward loves Joy more than life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-15
Updated: 2017-08-15
Packaged: 2018-12-15 17:30:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11810808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluesquints/pseuds/bluesquints
Summary: The Meachum siblings through the years.





	Hey Little Sister, Who's The One You Want?

**Author's Note:**

> Please heed the tags before reading. If you don't like it, don't read. Thank you and enjoy

He's five years old when she's born. A squirmy, pink, noisy little thing his father won't let him touch for fear of harming her. Not that he would go near her if he could help it. 

 

He doesn't like her at all.

 

She takes up all of his mother's attention, as well as their father's whenever he's home - which is more often since the baby was born. It makes Ward think his father loves Joy more than him.

 

He resents her for it until one night when their parents leave for some socialite gala in the city and decide to hire a terrible nanny. She switches the baby monitor off so she can watch TV in peace. The house is so big she doesn't hear the cries continue, but Ward's room is right next to Joy's nursery and he can't bear to listen to his sister's strangled laments.

 

He's too short to lift her from the crib so instead he pokes his arm through the bars and gently pats her belly the way their mother does. "Shh, it's okay," he soothes her. "You're okay. I'm your big brother and I'll take care of you." And it's a promise he intends to keep.

 

...

 

She's three when she makes her first friend who isn't him. His name is Danny Rand and his father tells him to play nice.

 

He doesn't.

 

…

 

He's ten and she's half his age when he hears their parents joking about their daughter's arranged betrothal to the little Rand boy. It never sounds serious but that doesn't stop the anxiety rising in Ward's stomach.

 

No one is good enough for his sister.

 

From then onwards, he makes Danny's life hell. Joy tells him to quit it, defending the boy at any cost. 

 

He hates it.

 

...

 

Their mother dies on the eve of Joy's seventh birthday. It's unexpected and while both his children are distraught, Harold doesn't shed a tear for his late wife. He hopes Joy doesn't notice. Their father may be a dick to him, but she deserves to live in ignorance for as long as her childhood would allow it. She didn't deserve to lose both parents.

 

…

 

He's sixteen when Danny and his parents are presumed dead. Joy cries and he holds her and keeps holding her even after she's fallen asleep.

 

He doesn't cry and he won't admit that, for all his bravado and the times he teased him, Danny was his friend too. Joy knows, like always, and she returns his embrace tenfold.

 

…

 

Two years later, their father dies. He holds her again and wishes he could tell her the truth, if only to spare her the pain.

 

She was still a minor and he'd only just turned eighteen. They'd separate them before long, claiming he had more important things to focus on that didn't involve caring for his kid sister, but Ward would not tolerate that. 

 

He fights to become her legal guardian. With the help of his company, he wins and he picks her up from school every day.

 

After all, Joy was the most important thing in his world. Such was what she meant to him.

 

…

 

When she's seventeen, she's more woman than girl. He wishes she wasn't so beautiful. It'd be far easier if she weren't. He hoped for a time he could look upon his sister and worry not for the eyes of others considering the depth of his gaze; his eyes betraying him with the things he shouldn't feel.

 

She's accepted at Colombia University and while he tried to convince her she'd be more comfortable living at home, she'd decided that dorm life was part of the experience. He considers visiting each Fraternity on campus to threaten any would-be-boyfriends away from his sister but he's not too concerned. She'd always come back to him.

 

…

 

She's twenty-one, newly graduated and she's ready to shadow him. He watches her reel in an investor with natural ease and raw talent and he thinks he's never seen anything more beautiful.

 

She doubts herself but he won't hear of it. She's already better than him. She always was, and, he thinks, he doesn't deserve her either.

 

That night, he kisses her clumsily and to his surprise, she kisses back. Its then that everything changes between them.

 

…

 

They fall into a pattern after that.  Mostly in the privacy of Joy's townhouse but sometimes the toils of running a multi-billion dollar company urge them to pull at each other's clothes during inconvenient office hours. Stationary is lost under furniture and said furniture ends up damaged beyond repair.

 

They'd never needed words to communicate their feelings and they both learn what the appearance of looser, flowing skirts and a conspicuous red tie means. 

 

Megan, their secretary, doesn’t know but they think she suspects by the way she looks at him as he closes the door to Joy’s office. “Cancel all of our meetings for the next couple hours,” he tells her and she complies and says nothing of it for fear of being fired.

 

With others none the wiser, they grow comfortable but tread carefully. Ward had considered sound-proofing their offices but Joy found that using her nails was a solution to keeping quiet when Ward lifts her onto the desk and buries his head under her skirt. When he's inside her, his skin turns red beneath her teeth and he loves that she's branded him. 

 

At some point, they stop being as careful and she’s arriving at work late every morning for two weeks and looking worse for wear. Her complexion is pale; her eyes bloodshot and she doesn't feel better until the morning gives way to noon. She’d abandoned form-fitting clothes in favour of loose garments, in an effort to hide what isn't even there yet.

 

He knows she's pregnant and he knows it's his doing - she'd never let anyone else touch her. 

 

They don't address it because they both know what has to be done.

 

After that, she's not the same. And, for all his feigned ignorance, neither is he.

 

…

 

To Ward's surprise, Harold notices a change in Joy's demeanour from recent press photos. "What's wrong with your sister?" The tone is, not unexpectedly, accusatory. 

 

He considers telling him, if only to see the look on his smug face. Instead, he thinks better of it. What he and Joy had was their own and he'd be damned if anyone tried to take it away from them.

 

He knows his father isn't above it - killing his own son. Not since he came back.

 

...

 

Life returns to normal and she's made Chief Counsel. Its that night, following the celebratory drinks, that she speaks of it.

 

"I wanted to keep it," she breathes into his skin.

 

He blinks away his own tears and kisses her neck. "I know."

 

He kisses the pain away for a while and loves her for all that she is worth. 

 

It's the first time he's touched her since. They're more careful than ever because neither of them want to endure that pain again. The pain that never stopped.

 

…

 

Sometime during the latest press campaign for Rand's domestic image, they're asked questions that are on the more personal side; so personal he can barely answer.

 

"Any romantic interests for either of you currently?" An all too-bold reporter asks.

 

He's taken aback but Joy doesn't blink, though he feels her tense up beside him.

 

"Our current focus is on our family's legacy: the company." She always had an answer for everything.

                                    

Later that same day, Ward ponders the question in the sanctuary of his office. He hadn’t even slept with anyone else since Joy, much less dated. She’d consumed him and became everything he needed to continue living in a world he’d rather not. All else fell short and he’d be damned if she forced him to go cold turkey. He was an addict, after all.

 

Without her touch, it was a world without warmth, without the guiding light of the sun. If it were entirely up to him, the only love that would bloom between them would be their own. Wherever they walked, Ward decided, they walked alone.

 

And yet, she could always find someone else, someone who wasn’t her brother, and have a child she could keep. Would that make her happy? Could he keep her from that?

 

He hates himself for considering it.

 

….

 

Rand is doing well in the global market when a blond vagrant manages to sneak his way into his office, claiming to be their long lost friend and Rand’s principal shareholder. 

 

"Don't do this to yourself," he tells Joy when he catches the small measure of hope in her eyes. He really means to say "don't do this to me" but he can already feel them drifting farther apart than their father could ever possibly conceive.


End file.
